carddav

She loves me, she loves me not. That’s the vibe you get with this weird Exchange ActiveSync saga/drama going on between Google and Microsoft right now. It was back in mid-December that Google dropped a bomb on the internet (and mostly Microsoft) by announcing that it was going to stop supporting EAS on January 30, 2013 – which is today.

Existing connections wouldn’t be affected, but going forward anyone trying to set up a Gmail account on a Windows Phone would have a less than ideal experience. Now we’ve got a temporary silver lining.

There's only just over a week left until Google flips the switch to drop Exchange ActiveSync support. Should you be an avid Google user and utilise Gmail (among other services) on your Windows Phone, you'll be left in the dark to an extent.

What the changes mean for consumers is from February onwards we'll no longer be able to synchronise calendars and contacts through a Gmail account (though email will still function normally) set up new Google accounts to take advantage of calendars and contacts using EAS (only email will function using IMAP). Those who already have accounts configured will be fine, according to Google.

Not all is lost, however. While you can take this as a golden opportunity to change over to Outlook, Microsoft is planning to support CardDAV and CalDAV in Windows Phone, according to sources familiar with company plans. The two protocols are actually Google's preferred route to synchronise content. Microsoft is attempting to work against Google's decisions of late to prevent consumers from being left out.